BY CHERYLE KENNEDY
Earlier this year, the federal government released the long-awaited plan to cleanup decades of pollution in the Willamette River. The plan is the culmination of extensive consultation with Oregon's state and local governments, as well as federally recognized tribes. Recent news about the Environmental Protection Agency working behind closed doors with industry representatives, possibly delaying the cleanup, is disturbing. As an elected official of the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde, I join the members of our congressional delegation in urging the federal government to proceed with the cleanup of the Portland Harbor.
Our tribe is a party to the 2001 Portland Harbor Memorandum of Understanding setting the framework for the coordinated management of the site. We have worked and collaborated with the other partners faithfully in the ensuing 16 years. We have also engaged in government-to-government consultation with EPA and the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality to ensure the cleanup is completed in a way that meets the needs of our tribal members and the broader community.
The people of the Grand Ronde have a deep connection to the land and water that will be affected by the cleanup. The Grand Ronde is a sovereign tribal nation made up of nearly 30 antecedent tribes and bands. Since time immemorial, the area we now call the Portland Harbor, including the bed and banks of the Willamette River as well as adjacent upland areas, has been inhabited and used by indigenous Chinookan peoples. These Chinookan tribes, along with the Multnomah, Clackamas and Cascades bands of Chinook, were signers to the Willamette Valley Treaty of January 22, 1855. That treaty ceded the entire Willamette River Basin to the United States in exchange for certain rights and benefits for the tribes in their traditional homelands.
Subsequent to treaty signing, the Portland-area tribes and bands, along with neighboring tribes and bands from the Willamette, Lower Columbia, Umpqua and Rogue Basins, were removed to the Grand Ronde Indian Reservation at the western edge of the Willamette Basin. Although removed to Grand Ronde, the tribes maintained strong, unbroken connections to the sacred places in their treaty homelands, including Willamette Falls and other areas on the lower Willamette River. Grand Ronde's traditional use of the lower Willamette River continues to this day with practices including fishing, Pacific lamprey harvesting and an annual First Salmon ceremony at Willamette Falls.
Oregon has a proud tradition of working together with tribes on a government-to-government basis. We are unique when it comes to state-tribal relations and we want to make sure that this administration and the Environmental Protection Agency understands the commitment from the state and tribes when it comes to ensuring that this cleanup happens expeditiously. This is something that all tribes, and all Oregonians want to see happen as quickly as possible for the benefit of all.
Cheryle Kennedy is the chairwoman of the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde. She lives in Dallas, Ore.